What is Customer Service Software?

Customer service software can be used by enterprises to build profitable business relationships with their customers to ensure steady revenue generation. You can place your customers in convenient categories based on their shopping habits, order histories, social mentions, feedback and other criteria. Another advantage is you can get insightful information about your customers from your communications with them on multiple channels such as phone, email, and social media. Customer service software offers more benefits by helping you to track prospects, carry out loyalty campaigns, and build a sales funnel. To start your search for the perfect customer service software, check out Freshdesk which is the current leader in this category as well as other highly rated applications.

How To Choose The Best Customer Service Software

Customer service is an important aspect of business and good quality software can help to streamline your processes and boost customer satisfaction. It can help you serve your online customers more efficiently and capture useful information you can use for improvement. Since there are numerous customer service tools available in the market, selecting the right one can be a difficult task. To start, be clear about your goals and unique needs. Consider the following list of factors and features as you look for the best customer service tools for small business and enterprises and do informed comparisons.

Get to know each product with free trial

Start by signing up for the free trials or demo offered by leading customer service software providers to check out their features free of cost and do a general comparison. We suggest you register for the free trials of the platforms that have received the highest SmartScore rankings and Customer Satisfaction Rating in our customer service software reviews, and to look for the best Customer Service software for your company. These tools are:Freshsdesk, Velocify, XSellco Fusion, Uservoice, BookSteam, OnContact, Preact, Gainsight, Salesboom CRM, and iTouchVision Contact Centre.

Targeted Businesses

Enterprise companies that have plenty of users, have complex requirements, and use an integrated software solution across all business units.

High-volume call center buyers who operate one or more big call centers.

Small business CRM buyers who wish add to add basic interaction tracking and trouble ticketing capabilities to boost customer relationships with strong support.

Field service buyers who work for large companies that offer service at the customer location and make use of mobile apps to work on the go.

What are Examples of Customer Service Software?

Freshshdesk: Freshdesk is an award-winning cloud-hosted help desk solution with really useful features and exceptional customer service.

Types of Customer Service Software

Live chat – Helps you provide customer service to your website visitors in real time.

Phone systems – These solutions are used in call centers and include features such as IVR, call transfer, call recording, and performance reports.

Ticketing system – This means an email-based solution using which agents can prioritize and answer queries.

Knowledge base – This is a self-help resource that customers can use to resolve queries on their own.

Community forums – Users can utilize these forums to ask questions, give tips, and reply to other customers’ queries.

Mobile in-app support – Take your helpdesk wherever you go by using mobile apps to provide customer support.

Key Features of Customer Service Software

Live chat: Allows agents to chat in real time with website visitors and automatically capture the content of the conversations in the ticketing system.

Customer self service: Provides a customer portal through which customers can find answers to common issues. The content of the self-help portal can include a knowledge base, how-to pages, searchable FAQs, and documentation.

Knowledge base: Contains a database of descriptions of common issues. This resource can be accessed by external customers or reserved for the internal use of support agents.

Multi-channel management: This feature enables management of customer interactions received through multiple channels such as phone, live chat, Web, mobile app, Twitter, Facebook and others. The software stores all interactions and they can be routed to the right agents for resolution.

Analytics and reporting: Managers can create custom reports that offer insight on time to resolution, team performance, customer satisfaction and other vital indicators.

Strategy and Goals: Define your company’s goals for customer service improvement. Which processes do you wish to address with the software? Do you have any industry-specific issues that need to be accommodated? Are you planning to provide customer support through multiple channels such as phone, live chat, email, and mobile devices? If yes, you need a robust customer service application that accommodates all these needs. If no, you can use a simple single channel service system.

Ease of Use: Your agents should find the software easy to use. It should be simple and effective to help them perform their work efficiently. You can use the software to streamline and simplify your workflow so that your agents are able to avoid mistakes. The learning curve should not be steep, so that it is easy to train your agents and implement the software with minimal disruption to your business services.

Scalability: The software should be scalable to meet the demands of your company’s future growth. Opt for a cloud-based solution that makes it easy for you to add or remove users as required. Make sure the vendor offers flexible pricing packages so that you can switch between plans as the needs arise.

Flexibility: A flexible, cloud-based solution can help your employees access the system from anywhere. They would be able to work from home, use their mobile device to access data, and continue to be productive even in the field. The vendor should offer flexible pricing options that can be changed easily depending on desired features, number of users, and company size.

Cost: The best solutions are sure to cost a little more. But don’t be stingy as they offer high-quality features and benefits. Contact the vendor and clarify important details such as technical support, resources, training, implementation, and the capability to scale up or down as per needs.

Technical Support and Training: Find out if the vendor charges for technical support and training. An initial training program can help your agents learn to use the software quickly and effectively. The vendor should provide 24/7 technical support through multiple channels to help resolve any issues you may have with the software. Select a vendor that has a good reputation for providing reliable technical and customer support.

Benefits of Customer Service Software

Integrations with Existing Systems: The customer service software should be able to integrate smoothly with the other business systems you use such as e-commerce, helpdesk, and financial management solutions. This can help to boost the efficacy of all the tools and improve your employees’ efficiency and productivity. Be clear beforehand about which integrations are important and select a software that accommodates all these priority integrations.

Customization: You should be able to customize the software with your company’s colors and logo to boost brand awareness and image. The system should enable you to create custom fields so that you can collect more information beyond the basic data.

Measurement: The customer service software can provide you insightful reports that offer useful data on key performance metrics such as time taken for each action, tickets resolved by each agent, ticket flow, etc. This will help you to monitor the performance of your support agents and identify areas for improvement.

Prioritization: The software can help you to prioritize important customers as well as issues. Your agents are sure to be inundated with customer queries and problems, and they need help in sorting out which issues to prioritize and handle first. For instance, customers who are on the highest tier need priority support and the software should flag their tickets so that agents resolve their queries first.

Splitting Tickets: This is an important aspect of customer service software. A customer may submit a single ticket that has three different queries that need to be resolved by three different units. Your support agent can split this ticket into three individual ones so that each unit can resolve their respective query.

Latest Trends

Mobility First: Stats reveal that using a smartphone to access the internet is becoming more popular than using a desktop or laptop for Web access. Therefore, market-leading companies are adopting a “mobile-first” strategy that goes beyond just making their website mobile friendly. These firms are making all their support channels mobile accessible.

Omni-Channel Support: Today, you can’t get away by just offering phone and email channels for technical support and customer service. Customers are increasingly using digital channels to purchase goods and they prefer using the same channels for sales support and customer service. Therefore, the need of the hour is to create strategies to maximize the accessibility and availability of customer service channels.

Potential Issues

How to Retain Customers: It is expensive and time-consuming to find prospects and convert them into paying customers. So, it makes sense to motivate your existing customers to provide repeat business. You can do this by offering excellent support that will make your customers happy. They will keep using your services and products and also recommend them to other people. This can boost your sales and revenue.

How to Reduce Support Tickets: A large number of queries and support requests can tax your agents. To reduce support tickets, you can offer self-help options such as a knowledge base and community forums that your customers can use to find out more information about recurring and simple issues. Some software programs can analyze forum questions and help desk tickets for certain keywords and use that information to suggest solutions to help customers. It’s a win-win situation as your customers don’t need to wait to get support, while your agents will have more time to focus on important tickets.

Bottom line

There is no doubt that your customer support agents need the help of a high-quality and reliable software to efficiently resolve queries and boost customer satisfaction. Select a solution that offers all the above mentioned features to boost the efficiency and productivity of your agents. Do not mind the cost of investing in a full-featured, robust solution that is packed with many useful features as you are sure to get good value for the investment in terms of enhanced reputation for customer service.

Things to consider when you invest in a SaaS

SaaS software provides many benefits such as easy setup, access, and integration as well as data security. To pick the perfect platform for your requirements, you need to do your research thoroughly. To start, begin with the following suggestions to consider and analyze the various apps:

Know your needs: First, be certain about your company’s needs and requirements. Why do you need to spend on a SaaS solution? What tasks and goals do you intend to achieve with the system? If you are clear about your needs, you can easily find an appropriate app that fulfills them.

Compare features and price: Make a shortlist of SaaS products that offer the tools you need and are within your budget. Read online reviews of the shortlisted apps to learn what each one offers.

Use the free trial and extend it if necessary: Subscribe to the free trials of the shortlisted platforms and check out their tools firsthand. This will help you to understand if the system provides what you need to improve your firm’s competence and productivity. Request an extension of the free trial if the time is too short to learn about the app’s effectiveness.

Talk to the vendor: Finally, talk to each vendor about the assistance and support they can offer. Try to discuss the fee and get discounts. Ask about the training and consultation they provide to help you to utilize the app effectively.

Similar Categories:

If you couldn't locate just the product you were searching for here's a list of various categories associated with Customer Service Software that you may want to examine:

Our Score Read More

FinancesOnline makes use of our unique SmartScore™ mode to examine all the software in the Customer Service Software category so that we can help you decide on the best possible software. It takes into consideration the following aspects: individual components, collaboration capabilities, custom elements, integration, intuitiveness, customer support, security, support for smartphones and tablets, general media ratings. As of now, Freshdesk is the leader in this category and we gave it the highest score in our tests. Following extensive examination it received the best results among its competitors and we strongly suggest that you consider it as one of the options for your business.

User Satisfaction Read More

An overview of general user satisfaction with the products in our Customer Service Software category based on our unique algorythm that gathers user reviews, comments and opinions across a wide range of social media platforms to help you make an educated buying decision.

100%

98%

97%

100%

99%

100%

99%

98%

98%

100%

Pricing Read More

Each vendor in the Customer Service Software category will have a different group of pricing plans for its service and every plan will include a different set of tools. Below we list the general pricing for the most affordable package provided for each product. Please note that advanced features may cost extra.

free

$5

free

$9

$8

$29/month

$50

by quote

by quote

$24

Devices Supported Read More

A summary of what kind of devices and operating systems are supported by the listed B2B solutions in the Customer Service Software category, including mobile platforms and web-based solutions.

Windows

Android

iPhone/iPad

Mac

Web-based

Laguages Supported Read More

Check which languages and geographies are served by the popular B2B services in the Customer Service Software category, including apps designed for international markets and created for multi-cultural teams of employees.

Pricing Model Read More

Learn what pricing plans are offered by the vendors in the Customer Service Software category to see which one fits your business preferences and budget best. Note that specific services can provide free or freemium accounts for you to test first.

Free

Monthly payment

One-time payment

Annual Subscription

Quote-based

Customer Types Read More

An overview of which types of clients a given B2B service in the Customer Service Software category provides for, from small businesses and non-profits to large enterprises.

Small Business

Large Enterprises

Medium Business

Freelancers

Deployment Read More

An overview of what types of software deployement are provided by every B2B vendor in the Customer Service Software category. While most of modern SaaS solutions are cloud-based certain solutions might offer an on-site deployment model too.

Why is FinancesOnline free?

FinancesOnline is available for free for all business professionals interested in an efficient way to find top-notch SaaS solutions. We are able to keep our service free of charge thanks to cooperation with some of the vendors, who are willing to pay us for traffic and sales opportunities provided by our website. Please note, that FinancesOnline lists all vendors, we’re not limited only to the ones that pay us, and all software providers have an equal opportunity to get featured in our rankings and comparisons, win awards, gather user reviews, all in our effort to give you reliable advice that will enable you to make well-informed purchase decisions.